Civil rights activist, Baptist minister, and presidential candidate, born October 8, 1941, in Greenville, South Carolina, USA.Son of an Alabama sharecropper (he adopted his stepfather's last name), he was a good enough athlete in high school to be offered a contract by the Chicago White Sox, but he turned it down because a white player was given so much more money. He also turned down an athletic scholarship at the University of Illinois when he was told that as a black he could not expect to play quarterback. Instead he attended the mostly black Agricultural and Technical College of North Carolina in Greensboro, and in addition to being an outstanding athlete, student, and campus leader, he took a lead in protests that forced Greensboro, NC, to integrate its restaurants and theatres.
Jackson attended Sterling High School, a segregated high school in Greenville, where he was a student-athlete. Upon graduating in 1959, he rejected a contract from a professional baseball team so that he could attend the racially integrated University of Illinois on a football scholarship.[2[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-MSN-1|]]] However, one year later, Jackson transferred to North Carolina A&T located in Greensboro, North Carolina. There are differing accounts for the reasons behind this transfer. Jackson claims that the change was based on the school's racial biases which included his being unable to play as a quarterback despite being a star quarterback at his high school as well as being demoted by his speech professor as an alternate in a public speaking competition team despite the support of his teammates who elected him a place on the team for his superior abilities.[2[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-MSN-1|]]] ESPN.com reports a different story, however. Claims of racial discrimination on the football team may be exaggerated because Illinois's starting quarterback that year was an African American. In addition, Jackson left Illinois at the end of his second semester after being placed on academic probation.[3[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-2|]]] Following his graduation from A&T, Jackson attended the Chicago Theological Seminary with the intent of becoming a minister, but dropped out in 1966 to focus full-time on the civil rights movement.[4[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-3|]]] He was ordained in 1968, without a theological degree; awarded an honorary theological doctorate from Chicago in 1990; and received his Master of Divinity Degree based on his previous credits earned, plus his life experience and subsequent work, in 2000.[5[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-4|]]][6[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-5|]]]
Jackson speaks on a radio broadcast from the headquarters of Operation PUSH, (People United to Save Humanity) at its annual convention. July 1973. Photograph by John H. White.
Civil rights activist, Baptist minister, and presidential candidate, born October 8, 1941, in Greenville, South Carolina, USA.Son of an Alabama sharecropper (he adopted his stepfather's last name), he was a good enough athlete in high school to be offered a contract by the Chicago White Sox, but he turned it down because a white player was given so much more money. He also turned down an athletic scholarship at the University of Illinois when he was told that as a black he could not expect to play quarterback. Instead he attended the mostly black Agricultural and Technical College of North Carolina in Greensboro, and in addition to being an outstanding athlete, student, and campus leader, he took a lead in protests that forced Greensboro, NC, to integrate its restaurants and theatres.
Jackson attended Sterling High School, a segregated high school in Greenville, where he was a student-athlete. Upon graduating in 1959, he rejected a contract from a professional baseball team so that he could attend the racially integrated University of Illinois on a football scholarship.[2[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-MSN-1|]]] However, one year later, Jackson transferred to North Carolina A&T located in Greensboro, North Carolina. There are differing accounts for the reasons behind this transfer. Jackson claims that the change was based on the school's racial biases which included his being unable to play as a quarterback despite being a star quarterback at his high school as well as being demoted by his speech professor as an alternate in a public speaking competition team despite the support of his teammates who elected him a place on the team for his superior abilities.[2[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-MSN-1|]]] ESPN.com reports a different story, however. Claims of racial discrimination on the football team may be exaggerated because Illinois's starting quarterback that year was an African American. In addition, Jackson left Illinois at the end of his second semester after being placed on academic probation.[3[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-2|]]] Following his graduation from A&T, Jackson attended the Chicago Theological Seminary with the intent of becoming a minister, but dropped out in 1966 to focus full-time on the civil rights movement.[4[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-3|]]] He was ordained in 1968, without a theological degree; awarded an honorary theological doctorate from Chicago in 1990; and received his Master of Divinity Degree based on his previous credits earned, plus his life experience and subsequent work, in 2000.[5[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-4|]]][6[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-5|]]]
Jackson married Jacqueline Lavinia Brown (born 1944) on, December 31, 1962,[7[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-nndb-6|]]][8[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-times-1987-11-29-7|]]] and they had five children: Santita (1963), Jesse Jr. (1965), Jonathan Luther (1966), Yusef DuBois (1970), and Jacqueline Lavinia (1975).[9[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-8|]]]
In 2001, Jackson was shown to have had an affair with a staffer, Karin Stanford, that resulted in the birth of a daughter, Ashley, in May 1999. According to CNN, in August 1999, The Rainbow Push Coalition had paid Stanford $15,000 in moving expenses and $21,000 in payment for contracting work. A promised advance of an additional $40,000 against future contracting work was rescinded once the affair became public.[10[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-9|]]] This incident prompted Jackson to withdraw from activism for a short time.[11[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-salon-jackson-10|]]] Separate from the 1999 Rainbow Coalition payments, Jackson pays $4,000 a month in child support.[12[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson#cite_note-jackson.mistress-11|]]]